Die Hard: Summer Days
by PLPwriter
Summary: Rated M for language only Weeks before Die Hard with a Vengence, John McClane finds himself in the middle of a gangwar in Harlem on the hottest day of the year.


DIE HARD:  
SUMMER DAYS

(Note: This takes place a few weeks prior to Die Hard with a Vengence, and yes, there was some inspiration from Predator 2 in here)

It was hot. The hottest day of the hottest summer on record in New York city, thermometers were sky-rocketing, weather men were infuriatingly accurate and tensions were high. It had been going on for weeks now and everyone knew that something was going to happen. Someone was going to snap┘

Unfortunately, the ones with guns tend to snap first.

Patrolmen Mills and Landis lay on the hot asphalt ground, groaning in pain from the bullets lodged in them. All around them more bullets flew by back and forth, some was so-called "friendly fire", but in their position, ANY fire was bad fire. It had been a routine traffic stop for the two motorcycle cops until Mills had spotted a pistol stashed behind the driver-side seat. The heat, coupled with the fact that gang-bangers have a naturally nasty opinion of police ended with them getting into a shootout in the middle of Harlem.

Officer Joe Lambert ducked down quickly as strafing fire blazed across the side of his already wrecked cruiser. Broken glass and debris rained down on him and Officer Connie Kowalski. Joe looked over to make sure Connie was okay, when she nodded, he turned to the left behind the other barricade of police vehicles to look for Ricky.

"So what the hell are we supposed to do now!?" He shouted over the constant screaming and gunfire.

Ricky glanced over the hood of his car and shook his head. "No way we'll be able to reach them without getting about 300 rounds in our asses. Where the fuck is SWAT!?"

Connie, who had been listening over her radio, turned to them, a look of despair on her face. "Your not gonna believe this, but they're tied up with ANOTHER gang fight over on 42nd street!" She said.

Ricky slammed his fist on the door panel, then shrank down as a bullet whizzed by him. Pissed off, he fired wildly until his gun clicked empty, then he ducked down again, reloading.

David Hatcher, tabloid journalist for Hard Edition stood at full height, even as his rival reporters fled the scene for their lives. "Yet another scene of carnage here on a New York street. Smoke, fire, oppressive heat! And in the middle of it all, a shootout between police and a small offshoot of the street gang known as the Cryps. Who the hell is in charge down here?! The cops? NOPE! They're out-manned, out-gunned and INCOMPETANT! Mr. Mayor, vacationing in upstate New York, get off your butt, get down here and declare martial law!"

A few yards away, Detective Lieutenant John McClane's police cruiser screeched around a corner and John looked out through the windshield at the approaching scene of utter chaos. He floored the gas pedal and smiled slightly as he bashed his way past a Hard Edition news-van, ripping it's bumper off in the process.

He screeched to a halt, drawing his 9mm Beretta from his under-arm holster as he hopped out of the car, ducking low and diving behind the cover of Ricky's police cruiser. "Welcome to the party, pal!" Ricky said, smirking as John came to rest next to him.

John glanced at the gang bangers entrenched behind numerous vehicles in front of their hideout. "So don't keep me in suspense Ricky, who started this cluster-fuck?"

"Well two motors pulled them over for reckless driving, but it went nuts when one of them saw a gun in the car and asked about it. More of them came pouring out of the building and started shooting."

"Well where the hell is SWAT? Or special weapons?!" John asked incredulously.

"They're tied up with ANOTHER gang fight on 42nd, fighting another group of the Cryps, they even shot down a chopper for God's sake!" Connie shouted to them.

John groaned, looking over at the barricaded gang members, then at his car. He mentally kicked himself for it, but an idea came to mind. "Be ready to back me up, I'm gonna have a chat with these assholes..."

Before any of his fellow officers could respond, John scrambled to his feet, hustling over to his cruiser and opening up the trunk. He pulled out several Kevlar vests (which he never used and had since collected in his car). He then quickly wedged them into the windows on the right side of the car. He then quickly jumped in, backing up with the door hanging open and letting it rip off on the Hard Edition van, further damaging it, much to the anger of Hatcher.

McClane backed up as far as he could, then stomped on the gas again, zooming towards the fire-fight. He swerved around the various police vehicles in the road and scraped against two, barely managing to fit through the space in the blockade. He ducked low, looking out through the open driver doorway to see where he was going as the gang members opened fire, splintering his windshield almost instantly as many rounds impacted it. He jerked the wheel to the left as he passed the downed motorcycle officers and slammed on the brakes, making his car a shield against the hail of gunfire from the gang-bangers.

McClane hopped out and waved the other officers forward. "Come on, get them out of here!" He shouted.

Several officers with riot gear on quickly moved out from behind the barricade using McClane's quickly disintegrating cruiser, rushing forward and grabbing the two downed officers, dragging them to the safety of the medics waiting. More armed cops began pouring fire at the gang-bangers, forcing them to take cover.

John, seeing his opportunity, sprinted around to the side of the building the gang was in and moved quickly up behind them, inside their circle of vehicles. Just as he came up, one member turned around, his eyes widening. "Yo! Wreck that pig motha-fucka!" He shouted, raising his gun.

John shouted for them to drop their weapons, but he already knew what was coming. He opened fire on the first man, downing him with three shots to the chest, he then rushed forward, diving behind one of the cars as he fired. Four more shots from his 9mm impacted a gang member before the others began returning fire, running inside the building as they did.

With the attention of the gang turned to John, the rest of the police rushed forward, firing as well. McClane was forced to take cover as his team mates fired. "SAME SIDE, SAME SIDE, DAMNIT!!!!"

As the police approached, Joe shouted for them to cease fire. Spotting McClane on the ground, he rushed to his fellow officer and crouched beside him. "You dead yet McClane?"

John groaned, uncovering his head and getting to his feet slowly. "No, I'm workin' on it though." He said, grabbing his gun from the ground and reloading it quickly as he headed towards the front entrance of the building. "Lets go get the rest of 'em, Ricky."

Ricky grabbed him by the shoulder. "No go John, Cobb says we cant go in."

"What?!" John asked incredulously, turning on him quickly.

Ricky nodded. "Yep, he says secure perimeter, surround building and wait."

"WAIT!? Wait for what?" McClane demanded.

"I dunno, some bullshit special unit or something."

"We let the bastards get dug in now, we'll have to level the building to get 'em the fuck out!" John said, punting a trash can across the sidewalk.

A few minutes later, the building's exterior was completely locked down and John McClane paced angrily as he watched absolutely NOTHING being done to get the gang members nestled down inside and arming themselves further. Things got worse however, when a woman was briefly dangled out the window on the seventh story, making it all too clear that they had a hostage.

John realized that this sitting around shit wasn't going to help, he needed to do something. That was when spied a fire-escape ladder hanging down into the alley next to the gang's building. He thought a moment, looking around. His fellow officers were all preoccupied. "This is a very bad idea..." He said, heading discreetly over to it.

"John, I'm doing everything I can, but we have to wait until-" Ricky said, realizing his friend was gone. "McClane?!"

John couldn't hear him though, he was bounding up the stairs of the fire escape, having jumped to the ladder from a nearby dumpster. He reached the fifth floor, but realized that the ladder to the next floor was ripped off. "Figures..."

John, quietly as possible, jerked the lock off the window of the 5th floor using a piece of the broken ladder and crawled in, drawing his 9mm from under his plaid short-sleeved button-up shirt (which was soaked with sweat). He headed into the room and opened the door a crack, peering into the hallway. He spotted two gang members in the hall, brandishing Mac-10 sub-machineguns.

John looked around for another way out of the room, not seeing anything obvious. He looked up at an air vent briefly, but shuddered from past memories and pushed that idea out of his head, heading back to the window.

McClane climbed out onto the fire-escape again, looking at the side of the building thoughtfully... And spied the very small ledge that lead all the way to a drain pipe from the roof. He groaned once, then climbed over the railing.

"Okay God, I know I've said this before... But I mean come on, you GOTTA have a hand in my life somewhere or else I wouldn't be in these messes all the time. So I gotta ask you not to kill me while I'm doin' this. If you do, I swear I'll never climb up a building again." John said as he skittered along the edge of the wall, heading for the drain pipe.

He finally reached it, gripping it as the life-saving object it was and bracing himself between the pipe and the wall, climbing slowly up the building. "Couldn't just go on with my day, could I? No way, I have to climb up the side of a damn building to do God-knows what to stop about 30 gang-bangers holding some chick hostage inside."

John strained himself as he grabbed hold of the ledge and did a chin up, pulling himself up over the ledge and falling onto the burning hot rooftop. He cringed painfully, getting up quickly to avoid singing his bare arms. McClane drew his weapon again, hurrying over to a large skylight, peering down through it into a huge room below. A room full of really heavy artillery.

"Shit what is this a gang-banger warehouse?" John said to himself, crouching to see better. After a moment, the gang members came bursting into the room, snatching up as many weapons as they could grab.

"Shit..." He said again, looking around the rooftop for another way in. There was none. That was when he spied an air conditioning unit on the other side of the rooftop from him. John holstered his weapon again as he ran over to it and kicked it as hard as he could. The unit shuddered and leaned to the side, so John reared back and kicked again, harder. The unit broke free this time.

A moment later, the unit came crashing down through the skylight, crushing a table beneath it and sending the gang members diving aside for cover. John didn't waste any time, he came sliding down the wire attached to it, using his shirt to protect his hand as he plummeted down, firing at the distressed men below.

As McClane hit the floor, he rolled and came up in a crouch, shooting one of the thugs in the knee cap. As the gun clicked empty, John popped the clip out, but before he could reload though, someone grabbed him from behind, wrapping a large muscular arm around his throat and yanking him off his feet. John's Beretta tumbled to the floor and he let out a choked-off squeak.

The thug held him firmly in his grip as his buddy rushed up, punching McClane in the gut twice. John grunted, tightening up to block the hits, then kicked out with his left foot, connecting with the gang-banger's jaw and sending him flying to the right. John twisted around and pushed off the broken air unit with his foot, sending himself and the thug stumbling backwards. John felt the weight of his opponent yank him backwards as they both tumbled down the stairs backwards.

John smacked into the door to the next floor down, groaning in pain. The thug groggily pulled out a .44 Magnum and tried putting it to McClane's head, but John grabbed his wrist and wrestled for control of the weapon. The thug was stronger, but luckily, McClane landed on top of him, so he had leverage on his side. Unfortunately, the thug WAS stronger and the gun began pushing towards John's face slowly but steadily.

John, realizing his death was imminent, pulled a desperation move and reversed the motion, PULLING on the gun instead of pushing it away. There was a horrifying instant as the dark barrel passed right in front of McClane's face, then he had it pointed up towards the top of the stairs. John held it with his right arm and elbowed the gang-banger mercilessly with his left arm.

The door at the top of the steps burst open and another thug came into sight, aiming a shotgun at them, so John simply squeezed his opponent's finger on the trigger, blasting the thug at the top of the steps six times. The second thug tumbled down the stairs and slammed into both of them hard, John felt the wind get knocked out of him briefly and pushed his way out of the pile-up.

He hurried back up the stairs and stumbled back into the armory, grabbing his 9mm from the floor and snatching up and Uzi from the table as well. He quickly headed to the room adjacent to the stairwell, checking both guns to make sure they were loaded. He kicked the door in and stepped in, looking at five stunned gang-bangers gathered there.

"Knock, knock." He said mockingly. "Now don't move and I wont-"

But that was as far as he got before all the thugs pulled guns on him. John shouted in surprise and opened fire with his Uzi, taking down two of the thugs before jumping for cover behind a sofa. He crawled quickly as bullets blasted through it, trying to put him down permanently.

Johnn shoved off the couch with his feet, sliding out from behind the other side and blasting at them with his Uzi and his 9mm. The Uzi clicked empty after dropping another thug, so he tossed it aside. John scrambled to his feet, socking the closer of the two remaining thugs in the mouth. He tried subduing the man, but his buddy punched John in the kidney's to stop him. John spun quickly, tackling the man to the floor and shattering a glass coffee table in the process.

McClane began mercilessly pummeling the gang-banger in the face. "Mother fucker I'll kill ya!" He shouted. After a moment though, the first thug grabbed John by the shoulders and flung him across the room into the sofa, knocking it backwards, making John end up on his back with his feet in the air.

McClane rolled back to his feet, shoulder-checking the thug into the wall and back-handing him in the face, grabbing a bong from the desk near him and smashing it over the gang-banger's skull, knocking him out.

John collapsed against the wall, panting heavily as he tossed the shattered bong aside. "That's your brain on drugs..." He said, chuckling a bit.

A few minutes later, the police stormed the hideout and were met by McClane, favoring his possibly cracked rib leading the hostage woman out, though she seemed to be helping him walk more than he was helping HER walk.

As McClane sat in the ambulance, Chief Inspector Walter Cobb angrily pushed his way through the crowd of cops towards John. "McClane! What the hell do you think your doing!? I gave specific instructions for NOBODY to enter that building!" He shouted.

"Yeah I know, I heard it on the radio." John said, partially ignoring him.

"Well that's the last straw, John, as of today, your on a three month suspension. FOR STARTERS. You'll be lucky if you ever come back again. Badge and gun right now." He demanded, holding out his hand.

John looked incredulously at the captain, shaking his head. "I just took out an entire chapter of the Cryps BY MYSELF and your gonna suspend me for it?!"

"You could have gotten yourself killed, or worse, the HOSTAGE. This isn't negotiable, McClane."

John glared at him, handing over his badge and gun, leaning back in the ambulance as the EMT shut the doors. "Story of my life." He said solemnly as the vehicle started off down the road.

John didn't know it, but at that moment, someone watched the ambulance drive off through a pair of binoculars. "Hmmm... Quite the cowboy he is, should be fun to see how good he is at Simon Says."

The End


End file.
